Craig is currently the featured writer in issue 36 of Erbacce Magazine. He has recently had work published in Poetry Scotland and Sam Smith's The Journal. His work can be accessed through this link: http://guthrielinks.blogspot.co.uk/

Thursday, 30 January 2014

There can be no poems on mornings like thisneither before nor after breakfast;they’ve build a fake refugee camp at Davos complete with soldiers and mock corpsesso the rich can dirty their shoe solesso they can rough up their retinas and call it experience, they'll call it learning and worthinessour world leaders can lean-in to conflict zone chicand they can learn something they’ll tell us that people can flourish in adversity sure, didn’t they visit a very close simulation of it?And didn't they cry about it?Oh yes they did.

My radio is spewing indistinguishable headlines about how everything everywhere is better nowand the rain is relentlessthe streets here are sleazy from itparents are driving their steam-filled cars full of children,they're sending them out to learn how to be obedient citizensin this country where people of conscience are jailedand my bed is a pit of insomnia where the self won’t stand up to questioningit can’t bear interrogations like thisthe self won’t get up out of bed todayand I don’t blame it,I'll have to leave without it.

Aoife Troxel has been writing poetry since the age of six. Luckily, she's improved since then. Before becoming a legal adult she was already two-time winner of the Poets Meet Painters Competition youth section. She has also read her poetry in Sežana, Slovenia as Cuisle Young Poet of the Year.

Tuesday, 28 January 2014

the second half of a pair of shoeswishes me a good daysat there in his cardboard box with his big broad smiletapping together his feet - a plimsoll on his left footoddly a wellington on the rightsmughe interlocks his contented fingers behind his head (does this guy not realise the cost of petrol or how much we must now to pay for a spare bedroom)out of touch this posh boy we call a prime minister actually does feelwe are all enjoying the fruits of a recovery together?

Sunday, 26 January 2014

It's been a dismal week this week, I'm afraid, with poems very thin on the ground. That being the case, we are all the more grateful to those regular contributors who did send in their work. We also send our thanks - and, of course, the gratitude of the bears - to those who responded so promptly and so ably to our call for submissions. We are pleased to say that we now have enough material to see us over the next few days. Please, though, do not stop submitting. We remain eager to receive your work.

On Monday, our poem came from Doug Polk who sent us 'Flames', his response to the current crisis in the Central African Republic. The poem makes the stark point that 'people dying on a daily basis' is 'not anything new' but part of 'the reality' of Africa. Moreover, we are told that, as the violence reaches'unprecedented levels', the total number of displaced people is edging towards one million. As individuals, it is hard, I think, not to feel helpless and ashamed in the face of such a situation. Certainly, that is my own uncomfortable position. What is there, if anything, that I can do?

On Tuesday, our thanks went to Darrell Petska for 'What's one Rhino?'. This poem is a response to a story about a hunter, Corey Knowlton, who has received a number of death threats since winning an auction to hunt and kill an endangered black rhino. It isn't that long since my own 'Goodbye, Western Black Rhino' appeared here at 'Poetry24' so regular readers will be in no doubt as to where my allegiance is on this one. Thank you, Darrell, for drawing the story to our attention.

Finally, on Thursday, E.R. Olsen helped us out with his 'Monarch' which alerts us to the fact that we may be on the brink of losing the beautiful monarch butterfly. Like the loss of the black rhino, this would be a tragedy. Want to think about it? Here's a picture to help. Have a good week. Abigail Wyatt

Tuesday, 21 January 2014

He's old and gray, cantankerous,and of little use to the ladies.His head'll prove way more valuableharvested than left to nature's ways.What a waste, and so painful, just to be eatenslowly to death by jackals, lions and vultures!The hunter'll do everyone a favor,rhino included. Thenthe 1499 remaining Namibian rhinoswill have better sex (Really! It's scientific!) resulting inmore rhinos. Hell, let's kill 30 old bulls each year.Or 300, making Namibia flush,the rhino population skyrocket,and the ranks of godly mercy hunters soar.A rhino? It's a walking gold mine.And a dead one is so much more than a head, severed by a saw,crucified upon a wall.

Sunday, 19 January 2014

This week's first poem "The Secretary Says" was by yours truly concerning the pronouncements from the UK Secretary of Education on the portrayal of the First World War by modern academics and comedy writers. Perhaps he cannot tell them apart? I'm sure that this is their fault. I apologise to all Siegfried Sassoon fans but the lines I used seemed to leap out of the air into my laptop.Paul Crompton's poem "Emotional Sandcastles" on Tuesday, dealt with two worrying trends in the modern world. Those of unemployment and sensationalist media.The lines: but I kill those memories because these streets are no placeto build emotional sandcastles.sum up the harshness of modern life under twin attacks from those two forces. Laura Taylor's poem "No Justice" was Wednesday's poem and an angry jagged little pill. I admire poets who can say so much in so few words. For example, from this poem, his life resides in a box;confined, entrapped, determined, defined...brings home the claustrophobic nature of inner city living in a strikingly effective manner.Thomas Martin's poem "The Upper Crust" outlined the growing gulf in society between an elite who do not seem to suffer from their own incompetence and an underclass who will never get a chance to make a better life for themselves and their families. The problem is summed up in the last two lines as:They know how to take money from the peopleAnd distribute it among themselves. Luigi Pagano's "Toujours L'Amour" performed a very surgical skewering of the "you wouldn't believe it in a movie" situation in France. The last lines:

Can you imagine Cyrano

- he with a large hooter-

going to meet Roxane

in a three-wheeler scooter?

catch the absurdity of the affair, perfectly.

I hope you all have a good week. My family and I are beside the seaside on N.Z's east coast, our favourite place. Keep up with the news and keep up the submissions.

Tuesday, 14 January 2014

I hit the city streets,a fistful of shrapnel tucked inside the pocketof a second hand jacket.Today the rain feels colder, heavier;and as the slate sky starts to pourflushing hope down the drain I stop to sign on the dole, again.

Inside officers guard the officein case poverty frustrations boil over; a thinning man in cheap red jumpersits trying to hide the tears he dries,as if the rug of self-esteemwas pulled beneath him, whena man the same age as his son ended his career with a faked smileand an attempt at empathy.

Fortnightly homilies cease, so I leave.Down the road, outside the law courtsjobseekers in their newest hoodiesand Primark slacks blow smokeinto the air like chimney stacks,but no one notices the irony.I want to shout it out to fat cat city planners, sat in their ivory towerssipping at cups of instant coffee,but it’s old news and no one’s listening.

I sit in café window seat and watchsingle mums, shoppers and office workers rush past trying to buy back a smile. I want to tell them happiness is freeif you know where to look,but if pushed I couldn’t point the way,the map lost in the modern day divorce.This makes me think of you, but I kill those memories because these streets are no placeto build emotional sandcastles, because no one would care if they kicked them over.

Monday, 13 January 2014

The Secretary says that historyis easy.The good guys won,and it was just guys,no woman did anything much.The baddies were driven offand it was all just marvellousjust and glorious.The Secretary says that historiansare all lefties and probably spieswho have been telling liesabout the war to end all wars.Although even hecould seethat it hardly did that.Then the Secretary sayshe won't take it backhe stands with what he said.He looks for credibilityand for his good name.But he did for them bothBy his plan of attack.

Sunday, 12 January 2014

First, Hamish and I would like to make our heartfelt apologies for the gremlins that have plagued 'Poetry24' of late. Although we have changed none of the settings, we have found that sometimes things aren't quite working as they should and, moreover, there have been times when I have been unable to get into the site at all. Please bear with us. We are doing our best to sort matters out but it may take us a while.

The fun started this week with Philip Johnson's 'same old same old' which makes a telling comment on a recent story about the 'boom industry' which has sprung up as a result of people's desire to see Detroit's splendid but crumbling buildings. It seems that we are all slow on the uptake when it comes to the concept of 'worth' rather than 'cost'. As the poem points out, it is 'two thousand years since the money lenders/ were turned out of the temple'.

On Tuesday, we went to Douglas Polk for his poem 'Egyptian Democracy' which was prompted by Egypt's military-backed government's declaration that the Muslim brotherhood is a terrorist organisation. This poem was followed on Wednesday by another by Philip Johnson whose 'the religion of humbug' was written in response to a story in 'The Telepgraph' reporting that supermarkets have been subject to criticism for stocking their shelves with Easter eggs only days after the Christmas festivities had ended.

On Thursday, there being no other submissions, it was down to me to write something. 'Imagine' was written with a sense of great sadness and in response to reports of an eight-year old girl captured while trying to detonate a suicide vest. I remembered my own daughter when she reached the age of eight and tried to imagine her being strapped into a suicide vest and sent off to die. How must that child's mother feel know?

On Friday, we finished the working week with James Schwartz's 'Polar Vortex Pioneers'. Thank you, James for your very topical contribution to 'Poetry24'. We hope to see more from you in the future. In fact, we hope to see more submissions from all our regular and from some new contributors. The fact is, I'm afraid, at the time of writing we have very little in out Submissions folder. Come on, chaps, the holiday is over. Have a safe and productive week.
Abigail Wyatt

Poet and slam performer, James Schwartz strives for the simplicity of Cavafy mixed with modern gay wordplay. His book, The Literary Party: Growing Up Gay and Amish in America, was published by in Group Press in 2011.http://literaryparty.blogspot.com/Twitter: @queeraspoetry

Monday, 6 January 2014

Maggie Thatcher thimblesowt that appears an "investment"so much is our faith in the bankour leadersgroan

cold night on the high streetturningyet the man who found some saxon gold in a fieldin staffordshire thinks there may be morebeneath the asphalt of the nearby M6 toll roadsays a mole in the pressreportjesus christtwo thousand years since the money lenderswere turned out of the temple:

Sunday, 5 January 2014

We started the week with Clare McCotter's "Neruda's Exhumation" which has some great imagery in it and examines the connections between Neruda, Pinochet and Thatcher. There is a lovely surreal image in :
You are there on hands and knees
trying to staunch the flow
with seashells and strange-shaped bottles..
We followed this with Philip Johnson's "mad as cheese" which has elements of mining humour in it until the poem leads to the mess left behind by fracking. I have an internet friend who lives in rural NZ who is being crowded by drilling operations. It is a very sad situation and she recieves very little help from the government or environmental laws which, we are constantly told, hold back progress. The second stanza is wonderfully evocative:yet we ask how do the holes appear in the cheesecoal dust gold diamondoil we dig sprinkle salton fish n chips.Wednesday's poem was David Subacchi's "Terraces"which combines nostalgia for his youth with the realisation of what happened at Hillsborough. It is a fine poem and I can't wait to hear it on line. The very last line of the poem brings the modern game into sharp focus as the very fans who love the game the most cannot afford to go and watch.Douglas Polk's poem "The Proposal" was our Thursday poem . A short poem that speaks volumes about the sort of relationship that Mr. Putin has with many countries. It sounds like that marriage will need a lot of help to be a lasting one. Poppy Scarlett's poem "Maybe" finished the week for us with a look at some of the issues surrounding the death of Princess Diana. We live in a time when theories gain currency just by being on the internet and the confusing bit it is that the most outlandish ones can turn out to be true. As the poem succinctly says "Maybe"

I hope you all have a good week and keep sending in your poems. there is a good level of poems coming in now but we are always keen.to get more.Best wishes to Abi who is a bit ill. Get the rest you need and take the time you need to get better.

Friday, 3 January 2014

I was one of those, the millions who cried when she died.For reasons I still can’t fully understand.Diana – she once a Princessseemed so misplaced to me.Killed in the back of a carfleeing from those who sought claim to her face.Money, everything is always about the money.It cost her, her life that night:Maybe?Continually steeped in the blackness of grubbyconspiracy theories – oh how theylined them up – then shot them down.Tin soldiers on the parade ground withno where to run.As into the matador’s arena they flungeach and every one.Today rest assured; we can all sleep soundly againhaving learned there was NOSAS involvement – did we ever

really, think there was.Surely, such men of honour wouldnever stoop so low.Could it really be that on thatfatal night -Two men – plus one denounced Princesseach exited this life.Fleeing from the eyes of the world in thehands of a driver who haddrained the bottle dry.Maybe?...

Thursday, 2 January 2014

Putin at the door with flowers,forget about the abuse,and the repeated rapes,the forced marriage,the disrespect and abuse shown the elders,and the children,you in the West don't understand,can't even begin to know,Russia at the door with flowers.

David Subacchi was born in Wales of Italian roots. He is a well known poet in the UK especially in Wales and the North West of England. His English language collection ‘First Cut’ was published by Cestrian Press in 2012.